Lunch In The Sky!

We made it! We wanted to have lunch on top of the CN Tower here in Toronto, and we did it, in the best possible way.

We started the day early with a phone call to “Downtown Volkswagen”, who is (tough guess here! LOL) exactly the downtown dealer for the German brand! (I’m so smart! LOL).

The car obviously need a lot of extra TLC from those guys, I think there’s a problem with the electronic panel that I hope they’ll be able to fix not later than tomorrow so that we can go on with our trip and not have to eliminate the three stops in Ohio and Indiana just because of what is happening right now.

Anyway, at least I can say we’ve been very lucky with the weather, especially this morning and afternoon up until around 3.30PM.

With Dan, who played “Tour Guide” with us today, we visited St. James Cathedral right in the heart of downtown Toronto, beautiful inside, with very colorful stained glass windows.

After that we decided to go take a walk at the lake front where you can take three different ferry boats taking passenger to three different points of the same group of islands. We decided to go visit Centre Island and so we did, blessed with a wonderful weather, with the sun shining over us.

For those of you who might ignore it, Toronto faces Lake Ontario, and therefore has beaches. The lake is so big that it’s impossible to see the other side of it on a regular day, this way, it doesn’t even feel like going to the lake, it is more like going to the seashore, which I think is something that really adds value and character to an already amazingly beautiful city.

View of downtown from the island:

After the visit to the island, it was time to go visit the CN Tower and have lunch up there as planned before.

Tickets to go up are expensive, I think around $30, so what we decided to do is to get smart and go eat at the 360 Restaurant they have on top of the tower! They had a fixed price lunch menu (three course meal) for $47 , and if from that you subtract the $30 ticket price you would have had to pay just to get up there, well, you realize it comes to a pretty cheap meal!

The view is breathtaking from up there, and the elevator is so fast (especially going down!) that your ear canals will “close” because of the pressure.

There were three of us, Hap, Dan, and myself. As soon as we got up on top, I asked if there was any chance to get a window table, and I guess it was our lucky day today, because we got the last one!

The restaurant takes about 72 minutes to revolve around its axis (where the reception, kitchen, restrooms are), a detail worth knowing because once you sit down, the view around you constantly changes, and if you were opposite the reception three minutes ago, maybe now you’re opposite the restroom!

The food was superb, thumbs up really for the chef and his team for the outstanding work they do every day. The waiting staff was also very good, although I felt at times that they somehow lacked proper training for such an upscale place like 360 Restaurant is. These are however, only minor problems, and certainly the view up there balances the result at the end.

We also got the chance to visit the observatory, and walk on the glass floor, a thick thick layer of glass on the floor, where you can test your bravery and look underneath. We took some pictures there as well, and then it was time to go, not that we had a time limit, but with the storm approaching the city, we wanted to get back home as soon as possible, and that’s what we did.
Dan and Ray cooked dinner tonight, at home: Beef Fillet with steamed asparagus, oven roasted potatoes, and a simply delicious green salad. Ray also baked a cake that we had over with coffee and ice-cream for dessert.

It’s been a pleasant day, for the weather, for the CN Tower, but most of all because we got the chance to spend it with two wonderful friends like them. Canadians are such nice people; I’m pleasantly surprised to see how people are so laid back in this country, no matter where you go.

I really like them, and if it wasn’t for the cold weather in the winter, I think I could call this place home, because they make you feel like home!

That’s all for tonight, we hope to hear from the dealer with good news tomorrow for the car, and drive to Niagara Falls where we’re planning on seeing the falls at night, and also spending the night there at the Konica Minolta tower, who looks a little bit like the CN Tower here in Toronto, only with a different view! LOL

Have a good night sleep,

Nico

P.S. For those of you who are interested in seeing the rest of the pictures, I want to remind you I post them every day in my Flickr.com web account.

The address is: http://www.flickr.com/photos/nikkosan